The Foundation of Team Ten
by captindonavin
Summary: The Ino-Shika Chou formation has lasted for generations, though there has always been people who stand behind them. For this generation, those people are Sai, Temari, and Karui. This is just a collection of one-shots that are about the significant others in our beloved Ino-Shika-Chou formation. Rated T for mention of some mature subject matter. InoSai, ShikaTema, ChouKarui
1. The Foundations Union

_**So, new story. This one is going to be a bit different, and I am still experimenting with it. So bare with me.**_

 _ **Enjoy...**_

* * *

…

Temari's POV

…

Once the war was over, the Konoha eleven and their significant others met up as often as possible. These meetings weren't as regular as they had been before the war. Most of the shinobi had either clan responsibilities or were higher ranking officials within the village. Though they still tried to all get together at least twice a month.

"And why can't I just talk to you?" Temari asked her lazy-ass of a boyfriend as they approached the group of famous shinobi who were already at the park that they were meeting at.

"Because I want you to have other friends in Konoha," Shikamaru explained as he shoved his hands in his pockets. "Who are you going to talk to if I go away on a mission?"

"Who says that I have to talk to anyone?" Temari demanded.

"I just don't want you feeling restricted," Shikamaru stated. "At least go out and try to be nice to someone."

"I am very pleasant and nice to people," Temari huffed as she was pushed into the middle of the already grouping shinobi.

…

Karui's POV

…

"I don't even understand why I'm here," Karui mumbled as her boyfriend, Chogi Akamichi, pulled her towards the group of his waiting friends. "None of them even really like me."

"You see," Choji started as they started to get closer to the group of people, "They just don't know you yet. As soon as they start to get to know you better, they'll love you as much as I do."

"But I still don't understand why I have to talk to people besides who you're talking to," Karui grumbled.

"Because I don't want you to become reliant on me. You need to build your own connections with these people. I'm sure that there's someone here that you'll like. Just promise me that you'll try to talk to someone?"

"Fine, I'll find someone to talk to," Karui huffed as she was pushed into the middle of the Konoha eleven and their clicks that were already forming.

…

Sai's POV

…

"Sai, we just can't have the same best friend," Ino tried to explain to her boyfriend. Sai had gotten better at socializing over the past few years that she had known him, but there were still a few things that he needed help to understand.

"But Sakura-chan is an amazing best friend. She's helped me understand people more than anyone else. I love my friends in team Kakashi, I don't understand why I have to talk to other people," Sai stated as they approached the large group of shinobi that had already gathered.

"It would just be weird if we, as a couple, had a mutual best friend. And I know that Sakura has been a great friend to you, and I'm not saying that you can't be friends with her, but you need other friends too," Ino tried again to explain.

"But I'm friends with Naruto as well," Sai attempted as a solution.

Ino sighed to herself. There was no way that she was going to lose her socially inept boyfriend unless she was blunt with him.

"Sai, I want you to become friends with Temari and Karui," Ino stated point blank.

"Oh," Sai responded. "They're dating the other members of your team, right?"

"Yeah, that's right," Ino encouraged.

"Do you want me to become friends with them so that we can become better couple friends?" Sai asked. "I read it somewhere in a book that boyfriends are supposed to become friends with their girlfriend's friend's boyfriends, and thus they become couple friends and are bonded more deeply."

"Yeah, it's something like that," Ino agreed. "I just think that it would be nice if you were all friends."

"Okay," Sai agreed. "I'll become friends with your friend's girlfriends."

With that, Sai walked into the center of already forming clicks to meet with the two girls in the center who seemed lost and a little annoyed.

"Hello Temari. Hello Karui. I am Sai," Sai introduced himself.

"We know who you are," Temari responded. She sounded annoyed, but her face looked slightly relieved.

"I know, but that just seemed like a proper greeting, is there another one that I should have used?" Sai asked as he stood in-between the girls.

"How about, 'how are you guys today?'" Karui offered.

"Oh I'm doing very well," Sai smiled.

"I think that was supposed to be a suggestion of what you could have used as a greeting," Temari explained to Sai.

"Oh, right," Sai nodded as he took out a notebook and scribbled something into it.

"So Choji and Ino sent you guys out to "make friends" too?" Temari asked.

"Yeah," Karui replied. "Choji is just scared that I might become too reliant on him in social interactions."

"Shikamaru too," Temari sighed. "I mean, he's right, I should be more willing to make friends. I just haven't found anyone that's too interesting yet."

"I know exactly what you mean," Karui joined in. "Everyone here just seems either over dramatic or fake. I'm not saying that my friends from Kumo aren't any less over the top, I mean have you met Omoi or Master B? It's just hard to fit in when you aren't already mixed into it."

"I love my friends here. I think that they are all very interesting and I can learn a lot from them," Sai interrupted.

Temari and Karui turned to stare at him. He wasn't wrong, the Konoha eleven were all very interesting and insightful people, but the two girls just didn't feel like they quite fit in yet.

…

Temari's POV

…

"You aren't wrong," Temari said as she tried to gauge the situation. She had noticed that all three of the significant others from Team Ten had been sent out on their own. Two of the significant others were immigrants into the village, and still had tight ties with their home villages. Temari knew that Shikamaru didn't do anything without thinking at least a hundred steps in advance. She knew that something was up about not being able to shadow him at this meeting, she just hadn't figured it out yet.

Temari continued talking to Sai. She allowed her views on the Hidden Leaf Shinobi to shift to side more with Sai than she had been earlier. She wanted to see if she was being tested in some way. There was a good chance that Shikamaru was testing Karui's and Temari's loyalty to the village. Though knowing the Nara as well as Temari did, she was sure that Shikamaru had already evaluated that and had deemed them loyal. Though, it didn't seem to matter if Temari praised the group of people around her, or belittled them, Sai reacted exactly the same. Temari just couldn't figure out what exactly she was being tested on.

"So why aren't you hanging out with Team Kakashi?" Temari finally asked Sai, hoping that he would let slip if he was spying on them.

"Because Ino said that I should start to get to know you and Karui better," Sai stated in the only way that he knew how: bluntly.

"Why does she want you to know us specifically?" Karui asked. "Are you some sort of spy seeing if we're loyal to the leaf?"

Temari was taken back. She knew that the Kumo kunoichi wasn't stupid, but Temari just hadn't thought that she would be thinking on the same path. Temari didn't want to add to the drama, but she was curious to see where this conversation was headed.

"No. That's not it," Sai said with a fake smile. "Though that would be a very smart strategy. I am here to build a bond with you so that we can become better 'couple friends.'"

"What?" both of the girls asked in unison. Temari was especially taken back by this revelation. She hadn't expected Shikamaru to go along with such a silly plan as this so willingly. Though Temari had figured out a while ago that Ino had some sort of power over the Nara.

"Couple friends are friends because they are couples, and they usually form within friend groups and hang out together in larger groups. It usually starts with a group of friends and their significant others being added into the group. The fact that the couples are friends with other couples strengthens the bond of the unit," Sai explained as if her were reading from a book.

"Yeah, I know what they are," Temari responded. "I just don't understand why Shikamaru would push for this."

"Maybe he really does want you to have your own friends in Konoha, and he thought that this would be the easiest way," Karui tried to explain. "I mean, I don't understand why Choji would put me through this either, but it does kind of make sense."

"Yeah, it does," Temari huffed. "I mean look at it this way, we're pretty much the only people here who aren't apart of the Konoha eleven. There's Tamaki, though her back ground is almost a mystery, so who knows where she really belongs in all of this. She seems content to sick to the dog-boy anyway. Then Tenten is the only girl who wasn't a part of the rookie-nine, but at least she was raised here."

"So that leaves us, and our common ground is that we are the Ino-Shika-Cho formations other half," Karui continued for Temari.

"So Shikamaru and Choji are going along with Ino's crazy 'couple friends' plan, because they actually really want us to make friends," Temari continued. "I'll admit that it was sweet of them, but I'm still upset that they would go about this in such a sneaky way."

"You mean that Shikamaru and fatso didn't tell you the plan?" Sai asked?

"What did you just call my boyfriend?" Karui yelled loud enough that it drew attention from the groups around them.

"It was a nickname that I gave him based off of a prominent feature," Sai explained.

"Are you calling my boyfriend fat?" Karui asked one final time.

"Yes I am," Sai stated as a fake smile spread across his face.

"Sai, that's inappropriate. Choji is a very nice man, you shouldn't call him names like that," Temari tried to explain using a gentler approach.

"Why are you being so nice to him?" Karui yelled. "Choji is your friend, shouldn't you be defending him more than that?"

"I don't see why it's my job to defend him," Temari shot back.

"Because his heart is fat too and he won't defend himself," Sai prodded.

With that an all-out brawl broke out between the three. Sai was receiving the brunt of the attacks, and wasn't responding with his own. He did however keep a grin on his face that seemed to egg the girls on even further.

…

Ino-Shika-Cho's POV

…

"See, I told you that this was a bad idea," Shikamaru huffed as he watched the brawl that was taking place in front of them.

"Their personalities just don't mesh," Choji added as he ate a handful of his barbeque chips. "I mean they're all great people, they just have too strong of personalities to get along if they're just thrown into it."

"Just watch," Ino stated with a grin on her face. "Sai has gotten better at making friends. I'm sure that he has a plan here."

"Ino, strategies are my specialty, and I don't see a single strategy in that mess," Shikamaru stated as he pointed over to their significant others.

"So this is why Shikamaru and Choji lied to you," Sai stated through the hurricane of attacks that he was facing.

With that, all of the fighting stopped at once. The two kunoichi's were frozen in mid punch. Their gazes slowly shifted so that they were facing their boyfriends.

"I think that you guys should run," Kiba called from somewhere behind the three.

…

Temari's POV

…

"Did you at least have fun today?" Shikamaru asked as Temari helped place another cold pack onto his back.

"Yeah, today was actually really fun," the blond responded with a grin on her face.

…

Karui's POV

…

"So are you going to see them again?" Choji asked as Karui spoon fed him some of her homemade soup. Soup which she had made in a form of an apology to her boyfriend.

"Yeah actually," Karui admitted. "We're meeting up tomorrow to actually plan out our revenge."

…

Sai's POV

…

"So did you actually have a plan going into that, or did you just get hit by accident again?" Ino asked as she applied a hot press to her boyfriend's head.

"I figured that if I could get them to hit each other and me, then we could be friends," Sai explained.

"And what gave you that idea?" Ino hummed as she rubbed his back.

"Well, you and Sakura are friends, and you hit each other all of the time. And Sakura and I became friends after she hit me a few times. Karui and Naruto are even friends, but that only happened after Karui beat him half to death. So I learned that girls make friends through hitting people."

"Well," Ino sighed. "At least it worked."

* * *

 _ **Okay, so I'm having a bit of trouble with this one. I already told most of you while I was teasing this that the updates are not going to be consistent. I am now going to add to that warning that the chapters may not be chronological order, they are mostly going to be little one-shots paced together whenever they come to me. I am trying to fill in some of the gaps that I have already left (because I always keep a back log before I start a story) so that I can give you guys as much order as I can, but no promises.**_

 _ **Secondly, the tone of the stories aren't always gong to be consistent. Yes, most of them are going to be silly like this one, but there will also be sad or melodramatic ones as well. I am going to try and keep what order their POV's appear in consistent, but again, I am not quite sure where I am gong with this.**_

 _ **I know that I made Sai appear a little dumb in this chapter, but trust me, he gets better. I also tend to use him as a deus ex machina.. But he's still lovely.**_ _ **And even though Sai is being added into the girlfriends, you will eventually notice a trend that he falls into the same roles that the boys do, just giving that spoiler so that you guys don't say that I am demasculinizing him.**_

 _ **I love these three characters, and since their significant others are pretty much family, I just thought that it would be lovely to see how they would interact and join in on the family dynamic. This is just the foundation chapter, so it will get more interesting as it goes on.**_

 _ **I am working on a new KibaTama story, and it is talking up the majority of my free time, not to mention that I work and am in school, so I don't have a ton of free time as it is. So these updates are going to be highly inconsistent. So even though I love hearing from you, please do not expect weekly updates. Thank you for your patients.**_

 _ **Please leave a review and tell me what you thought. I am also not against ideas for what situations you would like to see these three in. So.. Review and let me know your thoughts.**_

 _ **Love, Donny**_


	2. Just Shopping

_**So this wasn't the one that I was planning on posting next, but I loved it so much that I couldn't wait to post it. Why should I wait when it's all just one-shots and not ordered anyway? :P Anyway, I hope you all love it as much as I do.**_

* * *

…

Temari's POV

…

"So what are you guys doing today?" Shikamaru asked his fiancée. He normally didn't care what she did, but she had a grin on her face that spoke of nothing but trouble.

"Oh, we're just going shopping," Temari replied as the grin on her face spread and a slight blush appeared.

"Whatever you have planned, I'm not even sure I want to know," Shikamaru sighed as he closed his eyes and lounged back into the couch.

"Oh, you'll find out soon enough," Temari grinned as she leaned down and kissed the top of his head before she left.

…

Karui's POV

…

"I can't believe they're making me do this," Karui moaned as she prepared to leave.

"If you don't want to do it, I'm sure you don't have to," Choji offered as he watched her get ready.

"No, I want to do it, it's just so fucking embarrassing doing something like this in a group," Karui grumbles as she tried to keep her voice down. She knew that there was no reason to be yelling, it was just that her nerves were strung too tight at the prospect.

"Who all is going?" Choji asked. He had learned earlier that the actual activity was too embarrassing for her to talk about, and he had a bump on his head to prove it.

"Sai, Tenten, Tamaki, and Temari," Karui replied. "Stupid Temari and her relentless sex drive."

Choji tilted his head at his fiancée's strange mumblings, but decided to let it go. She would tell him what was happening when she was ready.

…

Sai's POV

…

"Oh, it's so exciting," Ino squealed from the front desk of her flower shop.

"Do you have any preferences?" Sai asked.

"No, no," Ino scolded. "It's much more romantic if you pick it out on your own."

"How will I know if I picked the right one?" Sai asked.

"Well, you already know my size and everything. I'm sure you'll do fine," Ino chirped as she pushed him out of the store. "Just make sure that it's pretty." **(a)**

…

Everyone met outside Konoha's largest lingerie store exactly when they said they would. The only two people who looked completely uncomfortable were Tamaki and Karui.

"Are you sure that I should be here?" Tamaki asked as she rung her hands together. "This seems like a more personal thing."

"Hey, I'm here too," Tenten reminded the cat girl. "And trust me, this is loads of fun."

Tamaki looked up at the large glowing sign and at the mannequins in the window who were wearing almost nothing, and swallowed.

"If you say so," Tamaki relented as she started to walk towards the door.

Tenten and Sai followed Tamaki easily as Temari drug Karui in by the back of her collar.

"It's not that bad," Temari scolded as she pulled her friend into the store. "This should be exciting."

"I'm not good at things like this," Karui protested. "The thought of planning it ahead enough to wear something especially for it, I'd be too nervous. What if he's not in the mood? What if I don't look good in it? What if he feels pressured and then dumps me because pressuring someone into sex isn't right?"

"You think too much," Temari grumbled.

"You sound like Omoi," Sai stated as he wandered into a section of the store that was full of frilly pink underwear.

"Like Omoi," Karui thought as she stopped protesting and allowed the blonde to drag her through the store. "Do I really sound like Omoi?"

"Yes, you did. Now let's find something nice for you to wear for Choji," Temari stated as she started digging through the garments, looking for something that might look nice on her friend.

The group spread through the store, but stayed close enough together so that if they found something that another one might like they could show the person. Most of the items held up for a person across the store to see were items that were ridiculous and flashy.

"How would you even get into this?" Tamaki asked s she held up a black mass of strings that was supposed to pass as lingerie. "More importantly, how would you get out?"

"It's designed so that you don't have to get out," Tenten illuminated as she stretched the strings to show that anything could pass through the holes.

"I'd have to change out of it eventually," Temari explained as a crimson blush covered her face.

"Then just cut it off if it's that confusing," Tenten responded.

"Have you seen the price of it?" Tamaki replied. "I pay less for surgical thread."

Tenten laughed at the girl as she placed the mass of strings back on the shelf and shook her head.

On the other side of the store, Temari and Sai were sorting through a pile of garments for Karui. Karui refused to look at most of the items, as she just blushed at the ground.

"Come on girl," Temari complained. "You are way more confident than this."

"I am confident," Karui agreed. "Just not with sex." The second part of the statement came out as more of a mumble; it was barely loud enough for her friends to hear.

"How can you be confident in some things and not others?" Sai asked as he tilted his head at the prospect.

"Well, it's just that," Karui tried to explain. She stopped to think so that her words came out as simple as possible. "I don't care what most people think of me, but I put a lot of value in what Choji thinks of me, so sometimes that makes me nervous. That statement is especially true when it comes to things where I am forced to be vulnerable – such as sex."

"So you would be more confident having ex with someone who you don't care about?" Sai asked to clarify.

"Technically yes," Karui said carefully. "Like on seduction missions I have no problem, though they've never gotten as far as sex. So yes, I would be more confident having sex that I don't care about, but I will never let that happen."

"What about this?" Temari interrupted as she held up a bright pink basque **(1)**.

"Uuuugh," Karui moaned as she covered her face.

"What's wrong with it?" Temari asked as she looked it over. "Right, it's pink."

Karui glanced at her friend out of the corner of her eye. It wasn't entirely a glare, but it wasn't an impressed look either.

"I'm sorry," Temari rolled her eyes. "I'm just trying to find something that goes well with your skin tone."

"I can help with that," Sai stated as he walked away and started to go through the store on his own.

"Is he going to go find me lingerie?" Karui asked as she watched her friend walk away in awe.

"I think so," Temari replied. "Now you and I can focus on me."

Karui groaned as her friend drug her into another section of the store.

…

Sai had set out on a new mission. He had entered the store looking for something for Ino, but he had found that almost instantly. Now he was looking for something for his dark skinned friend. He had to admit that her skin tone was harder to work with than Ino's pale skin had been. He didn't mind though, he just wanted to see Karui happy, and he assumed that as long as she didn't have to look at lingerie much longer she's be happy.

He was leaning towards the purples for the girl because it was a middle ground between her dark skin and her bright red hair. He felt as though she was too shy for a basque or a corset and was especially too shy for a playsuit **(2)**. He still didn't understand why the girl would be shy in front of Choji, but he settled on the fact that he would probably never understand.

"It'll have to be a baby-doll **(3)** ," Sai said to himself as he walked out of the section that he was in.

…

"Do we all have things picked out?" Tenten grinned as they stood outside the change rooms.

"We don't have to come out and show people, do we?" Tamaki asked as she looked down at the piece of fabric in her hands.

"No, but just know that we're here if you need help in or out of anything," Tenten winked as she walked into her change room holding an armful of corsets.

"Did you find anything for Karui?" Temari asked Sai.

"I think so," Sai said as he help up the items that he was holding in his hands.

"Oh this is exciting," Temari squealed as she placed the items in the change room and shoved her redheaded friend in after them.

Karui stared at the items that were hanging on the rack in front of her. There were mixes of purples, whites, and yellows. He had somehow picked out five distinctly different items in the time that Temari had given him, and they were all things that Karui wouldn't have picked out for herself. Well, nothing that she would admit to picking out.

There was a dark purple baby-doll, a three piece outfit that was yellow, a white and purple baby-doll, a yellow baby-doll, and a purple chemises **(4)** that had black and yellow flowers on it. She started with the baby-dolls, and avoided the three piece outfit altogether. In the end she settled on the chemises, because if all else failed, she could just use it as a nightgown without Choji suspecting a thing.

"Hold still," Karui could hear Tenten yell from the stall beside hers. Karui sighed as she assumed that Tenten had weaseled her way into help the vet with her choices of lingerie.

"I just don't like it," the aforementioned vet protested.

"That's just because you don't have it on properly."

Karui laughed silently at the pair beside her as she walked out of her stall- fully clothed. She saw Temari and Sai were standing exactly where she had left them. They looked at her expectantly and waited for her final judgement.

"I went with the chemises," Karui stated.

"Practical choice," Temari grinned. "It can be a nightgown, a slip, and a sexy piece to spice up your night."

"A slip?" Karui asked.

"Yeah, a dress that you wear under a real dress so that the outer one doesn't stick to your tights," Temari explained.

"People have that problem?" Karui asked.

"Well, people who live somewhere cold enough to wear tights," Temari said before she dismissed the topic with a wave of her hand. "Are you two done yet?" Temari yelled to the last two girls left."

"Yes!" Tamaki yelled desperately.

"NO!" Tenten corrected as the two began to squabble within the stall.

It took a few seconds, but Tamaki managed to burst out of the stall fully-clothed.

"I told you," Tamaki stated. "They all look the same."

"No they don't," Tenten pouted from inside the fitting room.

"Why don't you just show all of us?" Temari suggested in hopes that it would stop the duo's bickering.

"You okay with that?" Tenten asked as she poked her head out of the fitting room.

"Yeah, let's do this," Temari encouraged as the bun-haired kunoichi walked out of the stall.

She was still wearing her pants, but the top half of her was only clad in a corset. It was black and white and fit her beautifully. Tenten then proceeded to come eight more times in different corsets that were black mixed with different colours, if not fully black.

Temari groaned to herself. Tamaki had been right, they all looked relatively the same on the bun-haired girl. They all looked equally amazing, and fit her perfectly, though there wasn't much to tell them apart.

"So, which one should I go with?" Tenten finally asked as she walked out fully clothed and holding all eight of the corsets.

"I'd go with the red and black one," Sai stated. "It went with your hair colour and seemed to accentuate your features the best."

Tenten took what Sai had said and looked to the rest of the girls expectantly. They all mumbled something in agreement with what Sai said, and Tenten beamed.

"Well I think that I'll get this one as well, but definitely the red one then," Tenten beamed as she looked at the garments in her arms.

They all walked over to the counter and purchased the ones that they had settled on. Karui had her chemises, Tenten had her corsets, Tamaki had a leopard print teddy **(5)** , Temari had a dark purple and black basque while Sai had already purchased his and refused to show anyone. He claimed that it was a surprise.

…

Temari's POV

…

"So what did you guys do today?" Shikamaru asked from his position on the bed. He was reading some of the papers that he needed to hand into the Hokage for the morning.

"Well, if you look up, you'd see," Temari stated as a sly grin spread across her face.

Shikamaru looked up to see his woman leaning seductively against the door frame.

"How troublesome," he smirked as she left the doorway and started walking slowly towards him. His paperwork would have to wait for later.

…

Karui's POV

…

"Karui, are you coming to bed?" Choji asked. Karui had been acting weird before she left, and he had hoped that she would have calmed down by the time that her outing was over, but she had come home blushing and quiet.

"Yeah, I'll be out in a sec," she called back

Karui timidly walked through the door as she both hoped that Choji did and didn't realise what she was wearing. The room was only lit by the bedside lamp and Choji was sitting in bed wearing nothing but his underwear. He wasn't doing it to be sexy, he was just a warm sleeper. He looked up as Karui walked into the room and saw the light blush on her face, and how the soft silk clung to her curves.

"Wow," Choji gasped. "You look beautiful."

"Awe, shut up," Karui whispered as she crawled into bed next to him.

He pulled her closer to himself and planted a kiss on her forehead. He started down at her lovingly before repeating: "You look beautiful." Karui pulled him into a proper kiss in response.

…

Sai's POV

…

Sai waited patiently for Ino to finish changing in the washroom. He hoped that she liked it. He knew that it would look amazing on her, he was just scared that she wouldn't agree. Sai also knew that he wasn't supposed to rush her when she was putting on such clothing. She seemed to like to take her time making sure that everything was perfectly in place before she presented herself. He didn't see why it mattered, it all just ended up on the floor anyway.

Ino eventually came out of the en-suite. She was wearing a pale blue bra that matched her eyes perfectly and matching blue thong. Around the thong were suspenders that held up the fishnet stockings that she wore. On top of it all, a black robe draped off of her shoulders. The robe slowly fell down her arms as she strutted closer to him.

"Did you even know how sexy I would look in this?" Ino asked as lust dripped off her every word.

"Yes," was Sai's simple reply as he wrapped his arms around her.

…

* * *

 _ **Okay, so footnotes:**_

 _ **a) I assume that Sai would have been curious as to what the letters and numbers on her underwear meant. I also assume that Ino would find it fun to go lingerie shopping with him. Also, Sai is so good at picking out lingerie because he's both an artist and completely objective.**_

 _ **1) a basque is like a tight slip that often has sock suspenders attached to it. It is often equally patterned and see through.**_

 _ **2) A playsuit would be more like the first thing that Tamaki picked up- strings. Like, they cover almost nothing but still cost an outrageous amount.**_

 _ **3) A baby-doll is a light see through nightgown type thing that ends about the hips. It's usually completely see-through and splits just below the bra.**_

 _ **4) A teddy is pretty much like a one piece swimsuit.**_

 _ **So, I've been craving to go lingerie shopping for the past few months, but I'm too poor and haven't been able to justify it. It's the only thing that can bring me out of a slump. IT's seriously the only type of "Shopping therapy" that works on me. I love it.**_

 _ **Well, I was supposed to be writing for my Canadian Lit class.. I'm supposed to write my own piece of Canadian Literature, but I still have to decide what that means. So.. Wish me luck.**_

 _ **Love, Donny**_


	3. A Home Cooked Meal

_**Finally an update. I know it wasn't that long... but it may as well have been on my end.**_

 _ **Well, enjoy.**_

* * *

…

Temari's POV

…

"Shika, I think that I'm going to make mackerel tonight, is there anything that you want with it?" Temari asked her boyfriend as she pulled on her coat and started walking out of the door.

"Whatever you decide on is fine," Shikamaru called back from his position on the couch. He laid the book that he had been reading on his chest briefly as he watched his girlfriend leave.

"Fine, Mackerel and boiled egg it is," Temari declared as she walked out of the door. She could hear him mutter his word behind her and she grinned to herself as she walked away from their house. It wasn't really their house yet, she just stayed there when she was visiting Konoha, but she liked the thought of it being theirs. She even accidentally called it "our home" when they were departing from a gathering at Ichiraku Ramen. The Nara hadn't seemed to mind and when she questioned him on it later, he said that he didn't care because it would be true eventually.

A grin spread across Temari's face as she walked towards the market.

…

Karui's POV

…

"I'm going to the market, Choji," Karui called as she was leaving the door.

"I thought that you just went yesterday?" Choji called back as he popped his head out from the kitchen.

"I did, but I'm not used to cooking so much in one night, so what I thought would be lots turned out to be almost too little," Karui explained. "I need more pork and sauce and I think that I'm going to buy some vegetables to make stew for lunch tomorrow."

"Okay, that sounds good," Choji agreed. "I guess I'll see you when you get back."

Karui nodded before closing the door behind her. She sighed as she walked away from the house. She really wasn't used to having to buy so much food. She had only ever had to cook for herself before now. Sometimes her team would eat dinner together and she normally cooked for that, but that was it. So the first time that she had cooked for Choji, she bought the amount that she would need to feed her whole team, knowing that he eat a little more than other people did. What she didn't take into account was that he could eat for eight. Even after months of being with the man, she still hadn't gotten down how much she would have to buy for even one meal, let alone for a day.

He sure did love her cooking though. It didn't seem to matter what she made, he would eat it and claim that it was the best. Sure her team had told her before that she was the best cook out of them, but she just thought that they had said that because they were lazy and didn't want to have to cook for everyone. But her doubts were proven wrong the first time that she had cooked for Choji. Even though he had never tasted the dish before, he ate all of it before she had gotten a chance to try any, then he claimed that he loved it so much that he was begging for seconds.

A large smile took over her face as she thought about how much her boyfriend loved her cooking. He loved it so much, and it made him so happy, that Karui barely even saw cooking as a chore.

…

Sai's POV

…

"Sai?" Ino called from the back of the shop.

"Yes Beautiful?" Sai called back.

"I just realized that I don't have a plan for dinner. If there was anything that you wanted, you could go and pick up the ingredients for it now if you want," Ino instructed, still hiding in the back of the store.

"Okay, I will go to the market and see if there's anything that looks good," Sai stated as he packed up his notebook and headed out of the door. "I'll be back in a bit, Beautiful, see you later."

"Bye Sai," Ino called, finally sticking her head out of her hiding place to wave goodbye to her boyfriend.

"I wonder what I should get Ino for dinner," Sai asked himself as he started heading towards the market. "I know that she loves chocolate pudding, but I don't think that that's something that people eat for dinner."

Out of the corner of his eye, Sai noticed someone a head with four pony-tails coming out of it. He decided that maybe Temari might have an idea of what Ino might want for dinner. So he walked over to her. Just before he reached Temari, he bumped into someone who was mumbling about barbeque.

The impact caused Sai to fall onto his ass, and as he looked up from his position on the ground he noticed that the person who he walked into was Karui.

"Oh, hello Karui," Sai said from the ground. "I see that you're headed to the market as well. I was just about to go and talk to Temari who looked like she was going there as well."

"Well," Karui started as she helped Sai up from the ground. "Since I knocked you over and all, would you like to go through the market together? Honestly, I haven't quite gotten used to the Konoha market yet."

"Sure, and you can help me figure out what to get Ino for dinner," Sai agreed. "Should we invite Temari to join us as she's here too?"

"Sure, why not?" Karui agreed as they walked up to Temari who had been stopped at a nearby stall. "I might need some help carrying all of my food back to the Akimichi grounds."

The two friends walked up to Temari and tapped her on the shoulder. Sai watched as the kunoichi noticeably tensed up at the contact before turning around. Once Temari saw who it was, she relaxed.

"Did I scare you?" Sai asked with almost genuine concern in his voice.

"Nah, I just don't know many people here yet, so I wasn't sure who it could be," Temari explained as she took her bag of leaks from the tender and turned to actually talk with her friends.

"Are you guys here shopping as well?" Temari asked, even though the answer was obvious.

"Yeah," Karui answered. "I have to pick up more pork for Choji, along with more food on top of that. I'm just getting so sick of the same meal all of the time, and Kami, he eats so fucking much."

"Ino sent me to go get something for dinner, but I'm not sure what she'd like," Sai admitted. "When I saw Karui and you, I was hoping that you would be able to help me."

"Why do you think that we would be able to help you?" Temari asked.

"I do not know. I just really am not sure what to make her for dinner," Sai explained.

"Well then, I guess that we're her to help," Temari agreed as they moved away from the stall where Temari bought her leaks.

"How do you get Shikamaru to eat vegetables?" Karui asked as she eyed the strange leafy vegetable in Temari's bag.

"He's not a kid," Temari started, "So he eats what he's given. It also helps out quite a bit that he's scared of me. That way I can bully him into eating more food that I'm used to rather than Konoha delicacies."

"All they seem to eat in Konoha is ramen, pork, or fish," Karui complained. "I mean there's nothing wrong with that, but I miss the food from Kumo. It had so much more flavour. I love spicy food, not all this salty garbage that Choji loves so much."

"I know right," Temari agreed. "All of the food here seems to be covered in salt. Back in Suna, all of the food was sweet and smooth. I miss it, though probably not as much as you miss your spice, because I can actually make Shika try new foods."

"Back in Root, we ate mostly plain foods," Sai joined in. "We were given food rations, and they never included spices. I grew up eating plain rice and pork."

"Oh my poor baby," Temari gasped as she looked at Sai in disbelief.

"The first time that I ate anything that actually had flavour was with team seven at Ichiraku," Sai explained. "It was the best meal that I had ever eaten."

"But are you willing to try new things?" Karui asked as she got a look of excitement on her face.

"Yes, I guess so," Sai considered. "I am not a huge fan of sweet food though."

"That's okay," Karui grinned. "How do you all feel about having dinner together tonight?"

"I was going to make Shikamaru's favourite meal, but I am sure that he wouldn't mind a change in plans," Temari agreed.

"I did not know what I was going to make anyway, so I do not mind," Sai confirmed.

"Alright then," Karui announced. "Sai, would you mind sending out ink clones to our partners and explaining to them that the plan has changed?"

"No, I would not mind at all," Sai complied as he bent over with a scroll in his hand. He pulled a large paint brush off of his back and drew three versions of himself that climbed off of the page. The three clones immediately took off in different directions in search of the Ino-Shika-Cho formation.

…

As soon as the clones were out of sight, the two kunoichis grabbed Sai and started dragging him through the market. They ran from stall to stall as they picked out the ingredients that they wanted and would occasionally call to the other people in their trio to make sure that the food choice was going to be okay. As soon as the three carried as much food as they possibly could, they headed back to the Yamanaka residence to commence their cooking.

Karui took charge of the kitchen and started handing out tasks to the other two. Temari was obviously unhappy about taking orders at first, but as soon as they actually started to cook, she loosened up. Every burner on the stove was active, and at least three things were cooking in the oven as well. All of the counter space was cluttered with dirty dishes, regardless of the fact that Sai was diligently washing each dish that came his way. It took them the entire afternoon to finish making the meal.

Temari made filo pastries filled with spinach, and spinach dip with bread. She completely ditched the leaks, as she decided that her original plan was too mainstream for their current culinary endeavour. Karui made Jerk Chicken, with spicy stuffed tomatoes and some starch called plantain cooked three different ways. Karui also made a curry sauce for Sai to put on his rice and Temari made a thick sweet sauce for Sai's tofu.

…

Ino-Shika-Cho POV

…

"So when did you volunteer to have us all over for dinner?" Shikamaru asked his friend Ino as she finished closing up her shop.

"It wasn't me," Ino stated.

"Well that's a first," Shikamaru said as he shoved his hands in his pockets.

"It was Sai," Choji stated as he showed up outside of the shop as well. "He got Karui and Temari talking about their home foods and it made them miss it. So they decided to cook and introduce Sai to some wide variety of tastes. Turns out that he grew up on plain rice and pork."

"How did you find out so much?" Ino asked, sad that she wasn't the one with the most intel.

"I asked," Choji shrugged as he shoveled a handful of chips into his mouth.

His two companions nodded and they all started heading over to Ino's house. The scent of foreign food hit their noses before the house was even in sight.

"They must have left a window open," Ino noted as the scent grew stronger with every step that they took closer to the house.

"It sure does smell good though," Choji noted as his mouth already started to salivate.

"You'll eat anything, Choji," Ino stated in jest.

"He's actually really picky," Shikamaru explained. "He doesn't like trying new foods because he's scared of finding a food that he doesn't like."

"It's not just that," Choji continued. "I'm just so used to the taste of barbeque, and I love it so much. Eating other flavours just doesn't feel right some days."

Just as Choji finished talking, they had entered Ino's house. The table was set immaculately and each of the plates already had food on them. The kitchen was sparkling clean and the aroma of the foreign food filled the air. As the remaining members of Team Ten took their seats, their significant others came out and poured them glasses of wine.

"What's with all of the showmanship?" Shikamaru asked as Temari poured his glass of wine.

"What? We can't treat our lover to something nice every once in a while?" Temari retorted with a glare.

"Troublesome," Shikamaru muttered as he looked at the plates that were laid out in front of him.

Once everyone was seated with a glass of wine, everyone started to eat. The table was silent except for the satisfied groans from those around the table.

"Wow," Ino stated as she finished the last of her meal. "I didn't know that you guys could cook like this."

"You shouldn't be so surprised," Temari huffed, though everyone could see her pride at the compliment. "All three of us grew up fending for ourselves and having to cook for others. Of course we can cook."

"I am amazed," Choji grinned as he looked lovingly at Karui. "Even though that each of the flavours were so diverse, they seemed to complement each other amazingly. Each bite of food was a burst of flavour. That was the best meal that I've had in a while."

"I was scared that you wouldn't like it," Karui admitted. "I thought that maybe it would be too different for you."

"Anyone would be a fool to dislike this meal," Shikamaru stated. "Though I guess that it is our duty to clean up after you guys worked so hard on the meal."

"No, it's…" Karui started before Temari interrupted her.

"You bet your ass that it's your job to clean up, Nara," Temari scolded as she slumped down into one of the living room chairs. "Then once you're done we'll go and get dessert."

"What a drag," Shikamaru muttered as he got up to start collecting everyone's plates.

"You didn't need to make them clean up," Karui stated as she sat down across from Temari.

"I know," Temari stated with a grin. "But there's nothing sexier than a man doing chores."

* * *

 _ **I know it wasn't my best written story, but I'm still trying to get a hang of their personalities. I really liked the concept for this chapter though.. so, I did my best.**_

 _ **So.. I'm very excited, though I'm sure that not a ton of you care.. buuuuuuutt...**_

 _ **RENNAV GAVE ME PERMISSION TO USE HER CHARACTERS IN MY NEXT MAIN STORY! OMG I AM SO EXCITED!**_

 _ **Seriously, RennaV is probably one of the nicest and best writers that I have read on ff. If you haven't read anything by her, I completely recommend her as an author.**_

 _ **And I am looking for a beta for my next main story. If you are interested or know someone who might be, please contact me. I am mainly looking for someone who can tell me if my writing is as smooth as I hope it is, and someone who I can bounce ideas off of. It's just that this next story is going to be quite the challenge and I want it to be as absolutely awesome as I can make it.**_

 _ **Anyhow, thank you for reading. I hope that you are enjoying this fic so far, and please feel free to review.**_

 _ **Love Donny**_


	4. Lunch Date

_**I have put updating off for way too long. I'm sorry *hides behind rock to avoid angry looks***_

 _ **This chapter happens before the last one at some point. Like I think I warned, these won't necessarily be in order. And this chapter isn't as happy as the other chapters, but I really like it.**_

 _ **Enjoy**_

* * *

…

Temari's POV

…

"What do you think of Tamaki?" Temari asked as she finished putting the dishes away.

"She's smart and seems friendly. But I honestly don't know much about her. Why do you ask?" Shikamaru responded from where he was draining the sink.

"I don't know. I just thought that you might know something about her. I see her a lot, but she doesn't talk to many people. I just was curious about her," Temari answered before she gave her boyfriend a kiss on the cheek and started to walk away. "I'm going to go meet up with the girls for lunch."

"Don't you mean Karui and Sai?" Shikamaru asked.

"Yeah, they're the girls."

"Okay, have fun," Shikamaru called as his girlfriend closed the door behind her. He shook his head in amusement and tried not to think about how Sai felt about being called "one of the girls".

…

Karui's POV

…

"If you think that she seems lonely, why don't you include her into your group?" Choji asked as he walked his girlfriend to where she was meeting her friends for lunch.

"Because I'm scared that I might be imposing. Plus, she hasn't made any effort to make friends, so why should I force her to. If she's happy I think that we should let her be," Karui responded. "I just think that she looks lonely."

"Well, I trust whatever you decide to do with her. She seems nice enough. But I'll let you decide what to do."

The conversation ended as Choji and Karui arrived outside the restaurant. Choji gave Karui a bear hug goodbye, one that she happily returned before going into the restaurant to wait for her friends.

…

Sai's POV

…

"How long has Kiba been gone on this mission?" Ino asked Sai.

"I don't know. I know that he got sent out with the Ambu about two weeks ago, but I'm not sure if he's back from that one or not. Why?"

"Oh, it's just that haven't seen him come through the shop lately," Ino explained. "He usually comes through about once a week to bring flowers and catnip home to Tamaki. He thinks that it's funny to bring her cat treats, but apparently she brings the catnip to work. I just wanted to see if he was still away or if something happened between them."

"I'm sure that you would have heard about it from Sakura by now if anything happened between them," Sai concluded.

"Yeah, you're right," Ino agreed. "Kiba tells Hinata everything, and Hinata tells Naruto, and Naruto tells Sakura, and Sakura would for sure tell me. Just keep an eye out for it okay? They were cute and I'd hate for anything to happen to them."

Sai nodded before giving Ino a kiss on the cheek and leaving through the shop doors.

Sai meet up with Temari half way to the restaurant and they fell into easy conversation. Temari explained about how she loved the girls' outings and Sai beamed at being included as one of Temari's beloved "girls". Sai was telling Temari about a new behaviour that he was learning about when the girl stopped him in his tracks.

"Hey look, it's Tamaki," Temari pointed just as they neared their restaurant. And the blond girl was right. Tamaki sat in a window seat in the restaurant. The girl seemed to be holding a piece of paper and sobbing over it.

"Huh," Sai shrugged. "Ino was suspecting that they broke up, I guess that her hunches were right."

Temari looked over to Sai with a shocked expression. She hadn't heard of anything going wrong between the couple. Sure they were the newest couple in the group, but they seemed to be one of the strongest. Temari was also sure that Tamaki was way out of Kiba's league. Temari also knew from stories that Kurenai had told her that Kiba had been head over heels for Tamaki. That meant that if the two had broken up, that it had to have been Tamaki to do the breaking up. No girl cried that hard after breaking up with a guy.

"I don't think that that's it," Temari said, though she spoke slowly because she just wasn't quite sure.

The two stopped staring at the crying girl and entered the restaurant. They noticed that Karui had already grabbed all of them a table. They had to walk past the crying girl in order to get to their table. It was strange, because even though the girl was obviously sobbing, she wasn't making any noise. It was almost as if she was trying to not draw attention to herself.

…

"You guys see that too, right?" Karui asked as soon as her friends sat down across from her.

"Yeah," Temari confirmed. "Do you have any idea what it's about?"

"No," Karui admitted. "Though I've been sitting here long enough watching her cry, and no one else seems to notice it."

"Do you think that we should go talk to her?" Sai asked as he turned around to obviously look in the crying girl direction.

"Sai, stop that. You're going to make her notice you," Karui instructed as Temari pulled Sai back into their group.

"But she looks sad and lonely," Sai countered. "I read that people who are crying in public, no matter how quietly, are doing so because they don't want to feel alone. So shouldn't we go over there and let her know that she's not alone?"

The two girls looked at each other, stunned. Sai had a point. Why would Tamaki be crying in such a public place if she didn't want to be caught and comforted?

"Okay, let's go talk to her," Temari decided as she stood up from her seat. The other two followed her lead.

The trio slowly approached the crying girl. Karui stopped briefly to explain to the waitress that they were joining Tamaki at her table. Temari slid into the booth beside Tamaki while Karui and Sai sat across from them.

Temari placed her hand on top of the hand of the crying girl and gently started to stroke it.

"Hey, are you okay?" Temari asked while trying to catch Tamaki's eye.

Tamaki looked up at Temari. Her eyes were red and her face was tear streaked. Tamaki looked across the table at Karui, who also looked concerned. Then she looked at Sai, who had a small smile on his face. It looked as though he was trying to be reassuring.

"We couldn't help but notice that you were crying," Sai stated.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to ruin anyone's lunch. I just didn't want to be alone," Tamaki replied as she looked back down to the table.

"No one else seemed to be paying attention," Karui assured as she waved the waitress over. "Can we get a glass of water for the crying girl, a lemonade for the scary looking blonde, an ice tea for the pretty-boy, and a glass of sake for me?"

The waitress nodded and went back to the kitchen.

"Why are you the only one who gets a real drink?" Temari asked as she fake huffed.

"Because I'm no good at cheering people up," Karui explained. "And I have a feeling that I am going to need a little help to get through this."

"You guys really don't have to be here. I can go home if I am disturbing you," Tamaki whispered at the table.

"Now what kind of friends would we be if we just left you to cry, and you said that you didn't want to be alone, so here we are," Temari reassured as she slung her arm around the girls back.

"Since you are sad, would you have rather us ordered you a warm drink. I have read that those are supposed to provide comfort," Sai suggested.

"Sai, right now the girl needs water to replenish all of the tears that she's lost. But maybe, if she wants, after she drinks her water, we'll get her something warm," stated Karui.

"But if she drinks the water, won't she just cry more?" Sai asked.

"No, hopefully we'll be able to sort out whatever is making her cry," Karui replied.

"Why are you guys doing this?" Tamaki asked as she still refused to look up from the table.

"Because you're our friend of course," Temari responded.

"I am?" Tamaki asked, finally looking up from the table.

"Of course," Karui stated. "Anyone who is close to the dog-boy is cool with me."

"Yes, and I have always liked you," Sai agreed.

"The Konoha eleven have always been like a family, especially Team Eight and Team Ten," Temari started to explain. "They both lost their Sensei around the same time. And Sensei are like second parents. The leaders of Team Ten and Eight were also together, so the teams created a bond through taking care of Kurenai after Asuma's death. As their significant others, we joined the family. So not only are you our friend, but you are our family as well."

"Oh," Tamaki said as she fixed her gaze back onto the table.

"You don't have to tell us what happened, but we are here for you," Temari said.

Karui nodded in agreement while Sai smiled at the crying girl.

"Though, you should tell someone, because keeping it in is never a good thing," Karui prodded.

Tamaki let out a small, pained chuckle.

"What's so funny?" Sai asked as he cocked his head at the girl.

"Oh, nothing," Tamaki replied. "I was just thinking that keeping it to myself is how I ended up here. So maybe I should tell someone."

"It doesn't have to be us, but you should tell someone. Maybe even especially Kiba."

Tamaki looked up at the girl with the four spikey ponytails. Tamaki's eyes started to fill up with tears again, and she started to sniffle.

"Maybe Ino was right," Sai stated. "Did you and Kiba break up?"

Tamaki's teary eyes darted so that they were staring at Sai. Her eyes hardened as she glared at him.

"Sai, you shouldn't go around spreading rumors like that," Karui scolded.

"Oh, I am sorry Tamaki," Sai apologized with an honest smile. "I did not mean to offend you."

Tamaki's eyes softened again as her hands fell to her lap and her eyes back down to the piece of paper that was laying in front of her.

"It's okay, Sai. Kiba told me that you have trouble in social situations. I shouldn't have acted so harshly. It's just that, I'm scared that Kiba will leave me after I tell him…" Tamaki trailed off as their waitress came back with their drinks.

The waitress asked if they were going to eat, and Karui requested five orders of dango. No one minded that Karui was doing all of the ordering, because they were trying to focus on Tamaki.

Once the waitress left again, Karui turned to look at Tamaki. Karui took a bite of dango before she started to speak.

"I don't think you know how loyal that dog-boy is. I mean, he's even more loyal than his dog. Even if he leaves you at this point, I think that Akamaru has gotten attached to you as well, so it would be way more trouble that whatever happened is worth."

"I don't know," Tamaki mumbled.

"Then what happened?" Sai asked.

"I don't know. It's just that he wanted them, and I don't… didn't. I don't know. But now I'm scared that I can't even have one, because it's gone, and I didn't even find the right chance to tell him because he's been gone so much lately. But now it doesn't matter. Because it's gone, and he's not around," Tamaki blurted out before she started to sob again.

Temari wrapped her arms around the crying girl and pulled her in close. She stroked the back of the girls head and whispered to her that everything was going to be okay, and that she wasn't alone.

Karui watched the scene before her. She put down her drink and let out a sigh.

"Is the 'it' a baby?" Karui asked.

Tamaki went stiff in Temari's arms. The sandy haired girl started to nod her head and started to shake. Karui leaned across the table and pulled the piece of paper towards her.

"Eight weeks?" Karui asked, even though she knew the answer. She had read it off of the paper after all.

Tamaki nodded her head again in reply.

"Mine was twelve and a half. They had just congratulated me for passing the first trimester and said that the chances of it dying had been cut in half," Karui stated as she took a swig of her Sake. "I didn't leave the house for a week. But at least Choji knew and he was home."

"Ino has lost a baby too," Sai jumped in. "We were so excited that we were going to have a family, but it died before she was even far enough along to tell people."

Tamaki sniffled as she looked across the table at the two who had shared their stories. She looked between them and stared in awe. In Tamaki's eyes they were practically strangers, but they had guessed her secret and they had shared their own.

"I've been too scared to even try to have children," Temari admitted. "I've been in so many battles and have taken my fair share of kunai to the gut that I'm scared that I'll never be able to have children. I know that the med-nin are amazing, but I'm still scared."

"Losing children is a part of life," Karui stated. "But they say that it gets easier after the first."

"I just... I just," Tamaki started to speak.

"I know," Karui interrupted. "You feel like a failure and that he's going to leave you. But he doesn't need kids. He doesn't need to produce an heir, kids to you guys are just a bonus."

"I didn't even want it. I was trying to postpone telling him in hopes that it would just go away," Tamaki admitted into the table. "I guess I got my wish."

"Tamaki," Temari whispered to the girl beside her. "You didn't wish the baby away."

"If I didn't, then why did it die?"

"Babies are very fragile," Karui tried to explain. "Even once they're borne, there's a thing called "Sudden Infant Death Syndrome". That means that some babies can just unexpectedly and unexplainably die any time before they turn one years old."

"You're not helping," Tamaki mumbled.

"I'm just trying to say that you aren't alone, and you're not a failure for losing your baby."

The four stayed and talked for hours. They eventually started talking about happier things than miscarriages and managed to get Tamaki to smile. At the end of the meal, Temari convinced Tamaki to come home with her so that she wouldn't have to sleep alone.

"How much longer is his mission?" Temari asked in hopes that he wouldn't be gone too much longer so that he could comfort his girlfriend properly.

"Two more weeks, that'll mean that he'll be gone for nearly a month," Tamaki sighed. "The Hokage sure has been giving him long missions lately. The house get too quiet when they're gone, so it makes the time seem even longer."

Temari scowled to herself and looked over to her other two companions. Karui looked just as angry at the news, and Sai looked concerned. Karui fell back out of hearing range with Sai and explained to him what they were going to do.

Sai was going to go back to the flower shop and grab Ino. Once he got Ino, they were all to meet at the Nara's. Once at the Nara's, Sai was to stay with Tamaki and Shikamaru, while the girls went to go talk to the Hokage.

Tamaki stayed that night in the Nara's guest bed, and had been informed that Kiba would be heading home the next day. She didn't know what the three girls had said to the Hokage, but she was more than thankful for it.

* * *

 _ **Awe, they all care.**_

 _ **Well, I would say more, but my brain is fried from all my school work. And you know, from crying over the fact that Shippuden is about to end. Like come one, rip my heart out much. Anyhow, I hope that you are all doing well and your lives aren't too stressful. I hope happiness and consistent weather (her in Canada we've gone through all four seasons four times in the past month.. *sigh*)**_

 _ **Thank you for reading and please tell me what you thought.**_

 _ **Oh, and I thought about adding a segment called: here's a song I love, so you should too... Today's song is: Oh My God by JPNSGRLS (I have a playlist and will be going in order of it in this fic. the first was Southern Comforting, but you all already know that one :D)**_

 _ **Thank you**_

 _ **Love Donny**_


	5. Not as Planned

_**Sorry about the wait, school was torture for the last little while. Like honestly, exam season is brutal. But I hope that you enjoy this chapter nonetheless.**_

* * *

…

Karui's POV

…

"Choji, I am finished with this conversation," Karui stated as she knocked her chair over and started heading towards the door.

Choji followed her as she stormed off.

"Karui, I want to start a family with you," Choji pleaded as he watched his new wife storm away.

"No Choji," Karui sneered back. "It's the clan that wants us to have a family and the stupid Ino-Shika-Cho tradition."

With that said, Karui stormed out of the house and headed off to her best friend's house. She was angry, and hurt, and confused. As Karui stormed towards Nara territory, she knew that she was over reacting, but her personality wasn't going to let her back down.

…

Temari's POV

…

"We got engaged on the clan's time. We got married on the clan's time. Now you want me to let the clan decide when we have children?" Temari ranted as she paced the living room in front of her husband. She was angry enough about the turn that their conversation had taken that he hadn't even yawned in the past half hour.

"Technically we got married on your time," Shikamaru interjected. "We got married early because you didn't want to do that on Nara time, so you and Karui conspired to get married before planned, and you guys drug poor Sai into it as well."

"That doesn't matter," Temari yelled back. "As women and strong kunoichi, we took our lives into our own hands and decided that tradition would not rule our lives in your tradition run clans."

"If you don't want to have children now, we can postpone it," Shikamaru offered, in hopes that he could get his wife to calm down.

In response Temari threw her hands into the air and let out an exaggerated huff.

"No, we can't postpone it, because just like all of your other traditions, the Akimichi's and the Yamanaka's are also having this conversation and if I say no, then I'm postponing it for everyone," Temari tried to explain.

Just as Shikamaru was about to explain to his wife that the other families may be having the same qualms, the door burst open. Karui charged into the Nara living room as the door went flying off of its hinges.

"Temari, we need to talk," Karui announced as she grabbed the hand of her blonde friend and drug her out of the house.

"I am glad that you feel the same way," Temari growled as she followed her friend out of the house.

"Troublesome," Shikamaru grumbled as he picked himself up off of the couch and walked out of the door frame to his house. He was on his way to find his best friend, the husband of the woman who just tore his door off.

…

Sai' POV

…

"Yes I know how babies are made," Sai responded to his wife who was sitting nervously in front of him.

"Do you know how important babies are, especially to us because we are the head of a clan?" Ino asked as she leaned forward and grabbed Sai's hand.

"Of course," Sai replied. "It is our duty as the head of the clan to bring in a suitable heir."

"It's more than that," Ino started to explain. "Because we are tied to the Akimichi and Nara clans, it is very important that the next heirs are born as close together as possible."

"So not only do we have to start a family, but Temari and Karui are going to start families as well?" Sai asked.

"Well, that is the idea," Ino sighed. "As long as you are okay with it, we were hoping to start trying, all of us."

A genuine smile spread across his face as he heard the news. But before he could reassure his wife that he was fine with the idea, the door of his house came flying off. In charged two very angry kunoichi who pulled Sai to his feet and drug him towards the door. Before they left the house, they both shot Ino a death glare.

"How can you be okay with this?" Temari asked as she looked back at one of her husband's best friends. "As a kunoichi who has fought for equal respect alongside us, how can you let this tradition walk all over you?"

Ino stood up to fight her point, but as her husband was drug out of sight by his two friends, she let herself sink back into her seat. She knew that the two men who were practically her brothers would be there any second.

…

Karui, Sai, and Temari found themselves in a secluded room in their favourite barbeque restaurant. The waitress didn't need to take their order, as they had been there so often, and the shutters were closed around them for as much privacy as possible. The two kunoichi were silently fuming as they tried to calm down enough so that they could talk. The male in the room looked off into space with a gentle smile on his face.

"I can't believe that they would do this," Temari finally breathed. "Can't we have one thing that is sacred?"

The three sat in silence after the remark and waited for their food. They had definitely expected there to be more ranting over this meal, but they were too confused to get the words out. The two women knew that they had wanted choice, but they also knew what they were signing up for when they got married. Every choice from their marriage on, would be made as a unit with the three clans. They were no longer themselves, but pieces of a clan and a bigger picture.

The waitress came with the food and left. The three were still sitting in silence. Silence was unusual for this group. They had grown accustomed to being able to talk to each other easily. There was a heaviness in the air around them though. They were all scared to say what the other was thinking, until finally Sai broke the silence.

"Ino wants to start a family," Sai stated, as the smile on his face grew.

"Choji too," Karui stated with a sigh.

"Same with Shikamaru," Temari added.

"Then why are you so angry?" Sai asked as he tilted his head to the side.

"Because it doesn't feel like we have a choice in the matter," Karui explained. "It feels like the clans are forcing us into it."

"But don't you want to have a family with Choji?" Sai asked.

"Of course I do," Karui sighed. "I just wanted him to talk about it with me before he discussed it with the clan."

"I know how you feel," Temari chipped in. "I don't even know if I can have kids. So it would have been nice to have some warning so that we could figure something out without the clan watching me like a hawk. I don't want to slow you guys down. If you can have children, I want you to. I don't want you guys to feel like you have to wait for me."

"You know that they didn't have much of a choice," Sai interjected. "The elders brought it up before they had a chance to even think about it. The elders feel as if we have all been married too long to not have children on our minds."

"How do you know this?" Karui asked Sai as he paused to take another bite of his food.

"Because Ino was just as mad as you guys were after the meeting," Sai explained. "She came home crying and screaming about how the council should not be the ones to decide when she was ready for children. She was especially mad because she didn't get to talk to me about it first, to see if I was ready for the responsibility. Though, after her miscarriage, I already knew that I was ready to start a family with her. I can't wait to have a family that is mine." Sai ended his account with a small smile, he honestly looked excited.

"I know how you feel," Karui added. "I can't wait to give a kid the childhood that I never had. I mean, Master Bee did his best, but he wasn't a proper father figure."

"We won't even be able to pick their names, though," Temari interjected.

"What do you mean?" Karui questioned.

"They are the heirs to their clans, they have to follow in the Ino-Shka-Cho traditions. Karui, you will have a Cho. Sai, you will have an Ino. And I will have a Shika. They probably even have a roster for us to choose from, so we pick something that has a history to it."

"I am okay with another Ino," Sai admitted. "I will love it as much as my first Ino."

"And Cho isn't that bad of a name, I'm sure that I could come up with something cool to fallow it," Karui stated.

"And I love my Shika, I just don't know if I could handle another one of him moping around the house all day," Temari explained.

"Well, it's either that or another one of you," Karui teased.

Temari groaned and deadpanned into the table. "Could you imagine the arguments?"

"Well, let's just hope that it has an equal balance of the both of you."

The three of them talked and laughed about their possible future children for the next few hours. They thought of all of the possible names that they could that featured the mandatory prefixes, and laughed at the ridiculous ones. They discussed whether they would want boys or girls, and ultimately agreed that they would love their children no matter what.

"You know Temari," Karui started. "I wouldn't want my kid growing up without an awesome friends like your kid. So I'm willing to wait until you figure everything out."

"I'm sure that it's not as bad as you think," Sai chipped in, in hopes of cheering up his friend. "And the medical ninjutsu has come a long way. I am sure that you will be able to have children no problem."

Temari sighed and thanked her friends for their encouragement. She knew that they were right, and that she was worried about nothing. She just couldn't help but think back to Tamaki's tears all those months ago and selfishly hope that she would never have to cry her own.

The three soon paid for their meals and went their separate ways. Temari went to talk to her husband about looking into doctors and seeing if she could even have children. Karui went to apologise to her husband about making such a big fuss about it earlier. And Sai went to go and thank his wife for giving him an opportunity to have a real family.

* * *

 _ **And that's the start of the next generation. Though, the little kidletts may net be making an appearance for quite some time. :D**_

 _ **My song recommendation this chapter is: Constant Headache by Joyce Manor. I hope that you like it.**_

 _ **I don't know if you've caught on. But the songs are ones that I feel fit nicely with the couples in the story... though especially ShikaTema.**_

 _ **Love Donny**_


	6. Childhood Memories

_**So I know that it's been a bit. I've been trying to focus on my next main story, because I like to have a good stock upon chapters before I start to post, but I've hit a bit of a block. Though, maybe now that my next semester has started, avoiding homework will give me my ability to write back.**_

 _ **Anyhow, I hope that you enjoy this chapter.**_

* * *

…

Temari's POV

…

"Are you sure that you are going to be okay with them?" Shikamaru asked his wife for the thousandth time as he was walking out the door.

"Your mother and I get along," Temari assured him. "And besides, Mrs. Akimichi is a sweetheart. And I love Mrs. Yamanaka. Everything is going to be okay."

Shikamaru let out a sigh. He hated leaving the women in his life alone together. At least he wasn't going to have to worry about the additional embarrassing stories coming from Ino.

"Now, you go and have fun at the clan meeting. We'll be here when you get home," Temari teased as Shikamaru walked out of the door.

…

Karui's POV

…

"You ladies have fun now," Choza called after his wife and his daughter-in-law as they walked away from his son's house.

"Are you sure we're bringing enough food," Choza's wife worried as she looked at the piles of food in Karui's arms.

"I'm sure that this is more than enough Mrs. Akimichi," Karui said as she tried to keep the edge out of her voice. Couldn't the old lady have helped carry at least a little of the food she insisted on bringing.

"There's going to be you, me, Yoshino, Temari, Mrs. Yamanaka – and Sai is showing up, right?" the older, bulkier woman asked.

"Yes, Sai will be there too," Karui clarified. "He's just going to drop Ino off at the meeting first."

"Ah," the older lady responded.

Karui hated how her mother-in-law was so traditional. The older lady had given up her shinobi career when she had gotten married and had been a housewife ever since. The older Akimichi didn't entirely agree with Ino being made the new Yamanaka clan head; though the Akimichi showed her full support to the best of her ability. The families had grown up close and Yoshino and Mrs. Akimichi saw Ino as the daughter that they never had.

…

Sai's POV

…

"Are you sure that you don't want me to stay?" Sai asked his wife as they approached the meeting hall for the mountain clans.

"Sai, I'm sure, I'll be fine. I have Shikamaru and Choji with me, Choza will be here too. You just go and have fun," Ino instructed as she gave her husband a kiss on the cheek and pushed him in the direction of the Nara's residence.

"Okay beautiful," Sai replied as he started walking to his next destination. "You have fun too."

He was proud of his wife, she was the head of the clan, but he hated the fact that she had to go through those meetings that she hated. The elders had such a hard time with her being the clan head, because they had never had a female clan head before. Her parents had refused to have more children in case they produced a male heir; they were progressive and they didn't want Ino to lose out on her position as clan head just because she was a girl. Inoichi had been fighting with the clan elders since Ino was born in order to ensure that she wouldn't have a problem becoming clan head.

Sai assumed that the elders would have preferred that he was in the meeting instead of Ino, but she was much better suited for the role. She was strong willed, and even if the old men tried to push her around, she would kick their asses. He loved his wife for how strong she was.

…

The five women and Sai were seated around Temari's kitchen table and they all had a glass of wine. Conversation was flowing easily, and the mothers were already half drunk.

"You remember when Ino used to make the boys play house with her?" Yoshino asked her oldest friend.

"You be the daddy, I'll be the mommy, and Choji can be the baby," the older Akimichi laughed in her best impression of a toddler Ino.

"Why don't I ever get to be the dad?" Mrs. Yamanaka replied in her best Choji voice.

"Because you still have your baby fat," would have been Ino's response.

"Then Ino would send Shikamaru to work," Yoshino laughed. "And he always chose work to be behind the couch so the he could just go to sleep without her yelling at him."

"And the one time she caught him," Mrs. Akimichi laughed in response.

"He had a bump on his head for a week," the older Yamanaka added.

Temari and Karui laughed along with the older women while Sai sat silently drinking his wine. He had a small smile on his face, but he wasn't laughing like the rest of them.

"Or when you were trying to teach them how to cook," the older Yamanaka offered as a new topic.

Temari burst out laughing at that. "I can just see little Shikamaru with his arms crossed and complaining about how troublesome cooking was."

"He didn't understand why he had to learn, he said that it was women's work," the boy's mother chuckled. "Now Shika was never really sexist, just lazy enough that he hoped his wife would do everything for him."

"Well, that's not going to happen," Temari laughed in response.

"Choji loved learning how to cook. He figured that once he knew how to cook, that he could make barbeque whenever he wanted," the aforementioned boy's mother stated.

"And poor Inoichi," the man's widow added.

They told about how Ino was terrible at cooking when she was first learning, but she was determined to cook for her father. Ino thought that it was her job because her mother was too busy with the flower shop to cook for them most days. The younger Yamanaka made breakfast for her father every day once she learned how: eggs, rice, vegetables, and fried pork. She always undercooked the pork. Inoichi ate it every day for a month though and he would always look a little sick when he dropped Ino off at the academy. Finally, there was a day when Ino had time to eat with her father, and it nearly made her puke. Ino had scolded her father for not telling her that the food wasn't cooked. "How am I supposed to learn if you don't tell me that I'm messing up?" she scolded him.

Inoichi had always been soft spoken and shy. He was especially shy around women and his daughter was no exception. He did his best for her though. He wanted her to have confidence enough to live as a strong woman in the sexist world that surrounded her.

"Inoichi never had any control over the girl," Yoshino huffed. "He allowed her to walk all over him."

"Only because he loved her and he wanted her to choose her own path," Mrs. Akimichi replied in defence of the man.

"She still gave us a hell of a lot of trouble," Yoshino huffed, though her voice wasn't nearly as harsh as her words.

Ino's mother blushed in the corner. She had tried her best to discipline her daughter, because she knew that her husband wouldn't do it. Ino's mother had always felt guilty about putting more time into her shop than into her household like the other mothers did, but she knew that neither Ino nor her husband blamed her. Inoichi was more than happy to have the excuse to become a stay at home father. It wasn't because he was lazy, but because he hated fighting.

They spent the rest of the night drinking wine and going through old photo albums that the mothers had somehow smuggled to the younger Nara's house.

The boys came stumbling into the house long after midnight to find their counterparts still going through the photo albums.

"There had better not be any naked pictures of me on the table," Shikamaru stated as he walked over to his wife and took a sip of her wine.

"Oh, come on Shika," Temari hiccupped, "It wouldn't be fun if she didn't have at least one."

"I don't care if there are any of me," Ino chimed in as she looped her arms around her husband's neck and rested her chin on the top of his head. "I was a beautiful baby."

"You were a beautiful baby," Ino's mother cooed. "But your father and I wouldn't have been able to make anything ugly. I mean have you looked at us?"

Everyone laughed as Ino looked down at Sai.

"Our child will be even more beautiful, baby," Ino grinned.

"As long as it looks like you, it will be the most beautiful baby ever," Sai replied as he looked up at his wife.

Then Karui and the mothers cooed over how cute the couple was while Temari smacked her husband and complained about him not saying cute things like that.

"Well, if our child is anything like you," Shikamaru muttered.

"Watch it Shika," Temari warned with a grin.

"Troublesome," he muttered as he took another sip of her wine.

"As long as they don't show the pictures of us running around the yard naked, then I'm fine," Choji stated as he stood by his wife and leaned in for a kiss.

Karui accepted his kiss with a grin. "Now this is a story that I have to hear."

"It's nothing special," Shikamaru cut in before any of the mothers could start the story.

"We don't know whose idea it was," Yoshino started, ignoring her son.

"But the three of them decided that they were going to go play outside in the middle of their bath," the older Akimichi added.

"We had only left to get towels," Yoshino said as she placed her head in her hand.

"And they were gone by the time we got back," Choji's mother finished the story with a laugh.

The older Yamanaka was sad that she hadn't been a part of the story, but she would have never taken these stories away from her late husband.

"Inoichi felt so bad that he had let them slip by him, as he was supposed to be guarding the door," Ino's mother added in conclusion to the story.

The clan leaders eventually gathered their partners and mothers together and pulled them out of the Nara house. Drunken goodbyes were hollered down the road as those who were sober attempted to keep their drunk counter parts quiet.

…

Temari's POV

…

Yoshino was set up with a blanket on her son's pullout couch. His wife could hear the older lady grumbling about how she could take care of herself and didn't need his pity. Temari knew she wouldn't leave though, the old lady was lonely by herself. Temari laughed as her husband came grumbling into their bedroom about how drunk women were even more troublesome than normal.

Temari laughed as she pulled him in close once he was on the bed. He reluctantly eased into her arms as he laid down on the bed.

"Your butt was cute even as a baby," Temari giggled into his back.

"Just go to sleep, woman," Shikamaru grumbled, though he secretly found his wife cute when she was drunk.

…

Karui's POV

…

Karui had been the least drunk at the dinner, or at least she assumed that she had drank less than Sai. Though, he hadn't spoken much the whole night.

"Are you sure that you can handle her, dad?" Choji asked as they parted ways with his parents. His mother was extremely drunk.

"I've been handling her for longer than you've been alive," Choza responded as his wife leaned heavily on him while half asleep.

"Okay, goodnight then," Choji waved as he turned with his wife towards their house.

"How did the meeting go?" Karui asked as she walked with her husband.

"The same as always, we spent most of the time arguing the point that Ino could make decisions and then just left the notes of the changes that we want to make to be finalized next time," Choji sighed. "How was time with the moms?"

"It was fun, I got to know a lot more about you," Karui teased.

"Yeah?" Choji asked.

"Yeah, you were a fucking cute kid from what I understand. A lot better behaved than I was too."

Choji grinned down at his wife and pulled her in close as they walked.

"I'm glad that you had fun."

…

Sai's POV

…

"Ino," the girl's mother cried as they walked back to the Yamanaka residence. "I'm sorry."

Ino looked over to her mother, she knew what was coming because it happened after every gathering of the Ino-Shika-Cho foundation.

"It's alright mom, you and dad taught me that a woman can be the bread winner in the family. You gave me an amazing role model," Ino consoled her sobbing mother.

Sai watched from the sidelines as the two women gradually dissolved in front of him. He hadn't had a mother or a father and he had a hard time understanding the emotions that the women were expressing. All he knew was that the tears were somehow an expression of love.

Sai smiled to himself as he watched the women embrace in the middle of the street - he had a family and he was going to cherish it.

* * *

 _ **So, I kinda like how this turned out. It's cute and kinda fluffy. I think I may try to include the moms again in a future story, but I'm not sure. I've also been thinking about maybe throwing in a few one-shots that are specific to a couple, but I also think that that could defeat the purpose of this compilation. So let me know what you think. I was thinking about Karui and Choji because there really isn't enough fiction about them, but we'll see.**_

 _ **Today's song is: It's Cold Out Here by Modern Baseball.**_

 _ **I hope you are all doing well and have a great day.**_

 _ **Love, Donny**_


	7. Temari's Wedding

_**Hey everyone, sorry about the wait. School sure has been hecktic this term. Anyway, I hope that this was worth it.**_

* * *

…

Sai's POV

…

Sai waited patiently for his fiancée as she finished up in the washroom. She had been in there for over an hour preparing for the day that was ahead of them. She seemed to be in a fouler mood than normal that day, even though it was a day that she claimed to have been setting in motion for the past years.

"You know, she could have been a little more grateful," Ino complained from in the washroom. "He wouldn't be half the man that he is today if it weren't for me, and she doesn't even seem to understand that."

Sai nodded happily along with his future bride's ramblings. He held her dress in his hands, as he waited for her to be ready enough to put it on.

"I mean, the least that she could have done would be to make me a bride's maid. I'm not asking to be the maid of honour, just a bride's maid. This has to be the first time in generations that a Yamanaka hasn't been a part of a Nara wedding party," Ino huffed from in the washroom.

"But you put so much effort in this wedding, you planned the entire thing, I'm sure that she just wanted you to be able to rest and enjoy it," Sai offered.

"No, she's always had it out for me. I'm sure that she's still scared that I'm going to try and steal the Nara away from her. Can't she see that I'm over him now, I have something way better," Ino went on. She finally opened the washroom door and stuck her arm through so that she could claim the dress that Sai had been holding.

"I'm not scared of Shikamaru stealing you away from me," Sai confessed. "Because he doesn't even want you."

"What did you just say, Sai?" Ino demanded.

"I said that he doesn't even want you. He seems to be very happy with his choice of a wife, so I shouldn't be scared of him ever deciding to choose you, even though you are far more beautiful," Sai clarified, kind of.

"Nice save boy," Ino responded from the other room. Sai wasn't even sure what he had saved, but he was glad that he had done a good job of it.

Ino then finally exited the bathroom. She was in a long purple kimono that slightly trailed out behind her.

"How do I look?" she asked as a slight blush covered her face.

"Beautiful," Sai replied.

…

Karui's POV

…

"You aren't supposed to be more beautiful than the bride," Choji stated as he watched his fiancée exit from her dressing room. "You know, you'll put a curse on it or something if you keep looking this beautiful."

Karui blushed as she tried to brush off his compliments. She was wearing a simple purple kimono that had a neckline that hung just low enough for her to feel uncomfortable. The kimono had silver flower designs that hung around the bottom, it was just noticeable enough to set her apart as the maid of honour.

"Are you sure that I don't look ridiculous," she asked as she peered down at her cleavage.

"I think that you look amazing," Choji replied as he took his future bride's hand. "I would marry you right now if I could, but we'll sadly have to wait another two weeks."

"Don't you have a groom to tend to?" Karui asked, as she was completely nervous about her own impending wedding, and wanted nothing more than to be able to avoid the topic for as long as she could.

"I don't think that he needs much tending to. He is going into this pretty well prepared, and he wouldn't have gone into this marriage without thoroughly thinking it through beforehand. He's not having any second thoughts, if he was going to have them, he would have had them before he decided to marry her," Choji explained.

Karui nodded. She almost hated that her fiancé was right, she just wanted to get this day over with so that people would stop asking her if this made her jealous that hers hadn't come first. In a way she was, because she had to sit through two of these before her own, and it gave her plenty of time to second guess herself and her decision to move to Konoha and marry this man. But she was also glad that hers was last, because then she got more time to ensure that she was confident in her decision.

All of a sudden there was a rackette down the hall. There was yelling and fighting, and one of the voices was obviously the bride-to-be's.

"Don't you have a bride to tend to?" Choji teased as he had obviously heard the noise as well.

Karui sighed as she let the large man pull her in for a quick kiss before gently nudging her down the hall from where the commotion was happening.

…

Temari's POV

…

"Go. Get out. Leave me alone," she yelled as she pushed her two well-meaning brothers out of her change room.

"Geeze," Kankuro groaned, "we were just trying to help."

"I do not need your help to get dressed," Temari huffed as she slammed the door in their faces.

She knew that the boys were only trying to help, but she honestly just needed a few seconds to be alone. This wedding was what she wanted, it was what she had been looking forward to for the past three years, but she was also scared. Temari may have been the cruelest kunoichi, but she was still a girl. She was scared that she would trip as she walked down the aisle, or that maybe she wouldn't look as beautiful as she hoped in her wedding gown. Her wedding was the first in a series of three; a series of three that were all important and political. Ino and Karui's weddings would be compared to hers, and their dresses and elegance would be compared to hers for the rest of their days. Though, there were more important things that she was scared of as well.

This wedding meant that her home was no longer Suna. Though she had been living in Konoha fairly consistently since she had started to see the Nara, she had always been comforted by the thought of returning home. Though she knew that she wasn't going to NEVER see the beautiful deserts again, it still felt like she was being separated from them.

Then there was her brothers themselves. Even though they had proven themselves fairly well the past few years, it still hurt her to be leaving them alone. The first few times that she had left, she had a shit show to clean up on her return. They had gotten better over the years, but it was still hard to trust them. She had raised them from the time that she was young after all. She had changed their diapers and ensured that they had gotten food, they were all that she had for years. Now she was going to have a new family, and she was scared that she wasn't going to be enough.

There was a gentle tapping on the door of her dressing room. Temari was tempted to scream at the intruder to go away, but she didn't quite trust her voice enough to respond. So she sat there in silence and waited for the person on the other side of her door to make up their minds for themselves. The intruder apparently had decided to come in.

"I hope that you aren't having second thoughts," came the voice of one of her best friends. "We can't have you be the first one to get married, and also be the first one to run away from the altar."

"Shut up," Temari snapped back, even though she couldn't force the venom to show through in her voice the way that she normally could.

"You can't seriously want to fight me on your wedding day," Karui teased. "Now that wouldn't be a good show either."

"Uuugh," Temari huffed as she dropped her head onto her arms on top of the table that was in the room.

"If it helps," Karui started as she walked over to her friend and started to remove the four pony-tails from her hair. "I'm scared that I will miss it too. I'm even scared that I'll miss going home as an excuse to leave if things start to get stale between Choji and me."

"There won't be any more long winded letters that I write to him, that he replied to in half a page. His words were never less meaningful than mine, he was just more concise than me," Temari offered in return for her friend's confession.

"Or the good-bye sex," Karui added.

"It was always the best, wasn't it?" Temari agreed.

"Or the surprise visits when it was impossible to return for a while," Karui added. "Long distance wasn't all bad, but it sure is going to be nice to be with him forever."

"Yeah, it's going to be nice," Temari agreed, though she still refused to lift her head.

"Come on, let's get you dressed before all the boys out there lose their minds about not being able to see you," Karui instructed.

"Ugh, my brothers can be such a pain," Temari complained as she stood up.

"It's not just your brothers," Karui corrected. "Sai is out there, and so are Choji and Shikamaru. I was half tempted to let Sai in, but I'm sure that Ino would have had a heart attack if Sai was counted as a bride's maid and she wasn't."

"Should I have included her?" Temari asked, almost feeling a little ashamed that she had been petty enough to exclude the other blonde girl.

"It was your choice. I'm almost glad that she's not in your party, or else I would have felt even worse about not including her in mine," Karui consoled. "Though, if it would make you feel better, I'm sure that she would settle for being able to help with your dress, as she's probably better at this sort of thing than I am."

"You're right, and she will probably have some sort of romantic non-sense to say that will make me excited to walk up to the altar," Temari sighed. "Let her in."

Karui walked to the door and called for Ino. She told the blonde that Temari was having trouble with the dress and that Ino was the only one that could help. The skinny blonde didn't believe the cover story, but she went with it anyway, because she was grateful for the extended olive branch.

…

Shikamaru's POV

…

Shikamaru stood nervously at the altar as he waited for Temari to appear. They had settled for being married in the Hokage's tower as since they were the merging of two hidden cities, their wedding was supposed to be one of the biggest in history. The wedding was as Suna themed as Ino had been able to make it. His female teammate had even gotten a hold of Matsuri from Suna in order to help with the wedding. No matter how much Ino hated asking for help, she was also scared of losing Temari as a friend for fucking up on the wedding.

"What a drag," Shikamaru muttered to himself as he stood waiting at the altar. He knew that he was supposed to be happy, they had been planning this far longer than the council even knew about. He was supposed to be happy that he could finally call her his, but all he really wanted was a nap. Well, that wasn't entirely true. He wanted to nap beside Temari and not have her worrying about feeling productive because she was supposed to be in Konoha on business. He wanted to be able to hold her in his arms for the rest of his life; he just didn't want all of the pageantry.

There was no escaping the big wedding though, they were the merger for the two countries. If they hadn't had the big wedding, then there would have been too many people who were pissed off to count, and that was even more troublesome than the event itself. Shikamaru also knew that it was important that a woman got to feel like a princess at least once in their life, and he didn't want to take that opportunity away from his Suna Princess.

Shikamaru was wearing the same kimono that his dad had worn at his parents wedding. His mother was sitting in the front row, clutching a picture of Shikamaru's late father as she cried her eyes out. She was as proud of him as she was sad that she was going to lose her baby boy. She had insisted on helping him get dressed for the wedding, even though he was more than capable of doing it himself. He wasn't going to argue with her though, he knew that she needed it, and maybe he did a little bit too.

Soon a slow march that Shikamaru only recognised from the rehersal started to play and the door to the Hokage tower started to open. Karui and Choji came through the door first, as the maid of honour and the best man. Next Tenten and Neji came through as the bride's maid and the groom's man. Next little Mirai walked up the isle with her little dress. She only made it about half way up the isle before she got nervouse and ran to her mother.

Finally Temari walked through the doors with one of her brothers on each arm. The two men were wearing thick, black, layered kimono's that matched Shikamaru's. Temari was wearing a long white kimono that had purple embroidered flowers that started in the center of her back and worked their way down to the hem of her kimono. The collar hung low on her chest, but clung to her features in the most stunning way. Shikamaru couldn't keep his eyes off of her, but he did his best to keep it out of his expressions.

"Pick your jaw off of the floor, crybaby," Temari teased as she finally reached the altar.

"Troublesome," Shikamaru replied, though he couldn't bring himself to roll his eyes.

"You better treat her right," Kankuro warned as he let Temari's arm go.

"I don't think that she'd let anything else happen," Gaara responded, though the tone of his voice sent more shivers down his spine than Kankuro's threat had.

Shikamaru tried to smile in response, but he was cut off by Kakashi clearing his throat.

"Now that the threats are over, shall we get started?" the silver haired Hokage asked and the crowd laughed in response.

Shikamaru and Temari nodded in indication that they were prepared. Kakashi grabbed both of their hands and started to wrap them up in a crimsoned sash.

"Who is giving the bride away?" Kakashi asked as he placed the end of the sash in the couples' hands.

"I, Gaara, the Kazekage of the Sand do," Gaara replied.

"And I, Kankuro of the Black Sand," Kankuro added.

"Very well," Kakashi droned. "The bride and the groom may present their vows now."

Temari cleared her throat and pulled a small piece of paper out from the inner folds of her kimono.

"I, Temari no Sabaku, promise to be the wind in your sails. I will motivate you to go when you don't want to move. I will give you encouragement and will stand by you even when you feel like you could be doing better. I will love you always and I will never leave your side."

"Shikamaru?" Kakashi prompted.

"What a drag," he started as he cleared his throat. He didn't need a piece of paper as he had been so nervous that he had memorised it.

"I promise to stand by you no matter how troublesome it will get. And I promise to help you out and to follow your lead. I won't fight your battles for you, because I know you can handle them, but I will be there as soon as you need me. I promise to love you and to provide for you the best I can."

With that, Kakashi grabbed the ribbon that was wrapped around their hands and held them up. The couple turned their gaze to the Hokage as he got prepared to officiate things.

"Temari no Sabaku, do you take this man to be your lawfully wed husband?"

"I do."

"Shikamaru Nara, do you take this woman to be your lawfully wed wife?"

"I do."

"You better," Temari added with a smirk.

"Then with the power invested to me by the Fire Daimyo, I pronounce you man and wife. You may now kiss the bride."

"Get over here crybaby," Temari grinned.

For a few seconds it looked as though Temari was going to sweep the Nara off of his feet, but he stopped her last second and caught her by surprise. He took her in his arms and leaned her back as he went in for the kiss. The entire crowd erupted in roars of excitement for the couple. As soon as they broke apart, they were grinning at each other and practically laughing. This was the start of forever.

* * *

 _ **So, how was it? Was it cute enough? Did I keep everyone in character? Anyhow, I hope you enjoyed it.**_

 _ **Special shout out to my beta for this story: Poodie. You're the best. Thank you!**_

 _ **Song recommendation: A Comprehensive List of Things I love by Jpnsgrls.**_

 _ **love**_

 _ **Donny**_


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